Alexander George Muthoot, director, Muthoot Group, tells Deebashree Mohanty about how their in-house training and hiring of retired personnel have strengthened the in-house talent pool
Tell us about the HR strategies that Muthoot Group employs to keep attrition at bay and employees happyIJ
Today, Muthoot Group has 30,000 well-trained manpower. There are seven integral aspects that we follow — training, tie-up with professional institutes, fast-track promotion, education of the children of the office assistant/boys, communication, social security measures and incentives. A four phase training module including induction, orientation, theoretical classroom training and on the job training is followed with certification process. From the office boy to the senior recruitment, all undergo the four phase training. We’ve tied up with the Indian Institute of Banking and Finance wherein staff are encouraged to upgrade their professional skills through Junior Associate of Indian Institute of Bankers and Certified Associate of Indian Institute of Bankers courses.
We’ve also taken the onus of educating two children of office assistants up to Class XII so that financial burden on the office assistant lessens. Moreover, we have an internal communication through forums like daily morning prayers, news and views, circulars, newsletters, memoranda, IOMs, annual general meetings among others. Through social security measures, we’ve always contributed to employees provident fund, pension fund and employees deposit linked insurance scheme at the prescribed rates.
How important is it to give employees the freedom of expressionIJ
A real management is when the staff is empowered, productive, contributing and happy. Thus, our staff are empowered with various rights in the organisation be it delegation of authority, leadership vision, Muthoot live online platform or department head meeting. The introduction of delegation of authority to the regional managers and branch managers has brought a great sense of commitment and responsibility amongst them. We’ve asked each department across the divisions to create their own vision and mission at the start of the year and work towards that goal that led to more measurable and quantifiable progress. Through Muthootlive, an online portal, any employee can put forward his/her suggestions or grievances.
Tell us more about your training academy and collegesIJ
Apart from the four phases of training, Muthoot HR department has established—
Management academy: The institute near Kochi provides specialised residential training to all senior staff . The training comprises of overall personality development, motivational training along with product innovation, product knowledge etc providing customer service with delight.
Staff training colleges in Kochi and New Delhi focuses on personality development of the staff.
Regional learning centres are present in all regions. Besides giving four tier induction these learning centres have tie-ups with renowned speakers.
Tell us more about re-hiring and training of retired personnelIJ
We’ve been employing retired bankers and utilising their rich expertise and experience in the banking field. The company has also started recruiting ex-defence personnels. Today, we’ve around 3900 retirees, primarily ex-bankers and ex-defence personnel, working in more than 4,400 plus branches across India as general managers, regional managers, branch managers, chief managers and senior managers.
The silver generation brings with them ethics, values, reliability, dependability, trustworthiness, goodwill, integrity, rich experience and better expertise which creates credibility in the market and among the customer thereby, resulting in growth of the business. Their recruitment has been bringing a considerable change in the organisation as the values that they uphold gets translated into the younger generation whereby they bring in stability, focus and mentor the new generation.
How has the rural branches helped in the uplift of people in that beltIJ
Through our persistent efforts, we successfully brought thousands of rural and semi-urban Indians into the banking net for the very first time, helped them associate with organised banking/financial services and provided every Indian a share of economic growth and freedom through their untapped valuable asset.
This has also led towards customer protection from scrupulous money lenders. The majority of the loan proposals are in the areas where the population is less than 50,000 and the income of the people is less than Rs 1 lakh.
What are the new strategies for employeesIJ
We are planning an ‘employee engagement with new joinee programme. This engagement is to ensure that the new joinee settles down smoothly in the organisation.